Joven y Alocada

"Joven y alocada" is a rare bird in its species, I believe. Coming from Chile, it is said to be a real story, told in first person and based on the experiences of a teenage blogger, who starts discovering her own sexuality while being raised in a very religious family (Evangelical).

It depicts a modern society in the "open-mindedness" and yearning for self-discovery of its young protagonists, who face the traditional side of society represented by austere religion. Daniela, the protagonist, experiments with love, trying to fit love for man, woman and Jesus in herself.

The movie integrates new technologies (blog entries, messenger chats) with the actual scenes, and it is innovative in this way, although it looks already a bit outdated, the way online interaction was in 2012. It includes a good deal of Chilean slang, especially words used online and among young people.

The soundtrack is a fundamental part of the movie too, with Chilean technopop star Javiera Mena's original songs and her covers of "Je ne regrette rien", "Sólo te pido la luna" and others.

These three elements (new technologies, the main story and the music) are beautifully wrapped with bright colors and details, it is easy to see the real person whose life and blog the movie reflects, was close to the making of the film and looked after its creation.

This one was a surprise for me. I expect most foreign films to be good, but this one was really different, and make you really engage your brain. First of all, if you don't understand the language, you have to read subtitles, and there's such rapid dialogue, that you have to read fast or you'll miss out. Which means you tend to miss a bit of the visuals, but it can be done without missing too much.

As for the story, it's fascinating, and pretty disturbing, to see the lengths an evangelical family will go to try to keep their daughter from having sex. Let's just say "slut shaming" is taken to an extreme level in this family. You can feel the poor girl's angst; it's not pleasant.

This movie explores the darker side of growing up and trying to find one's place in the world. It's not for prudes or people afraid of human sexuality. 7/10 stars.

Graphic images however the strong sense of such issues are realistic

The film is made beautifully close-up and is high-key almost entirely. It depicts love and sexual troubles of a young woman in a religiously orthodox family.

While the film is very slow, it is pleasant to watch and it will make you feel good.

The film is very bold in nature as it attacks some common taboos present in religious communities around the world, and does it in a wonderfully natural way. You can fully believe characters in the movie are real, as normal life is "boring" in many ways, just as it is depicted in the movie.

Sex scenes are wonderfully made, they are positively beautiful. They look authentic and will make you feel happy and light.

Wholeheartedly recommended.

Living in the American South's Bible Belt, I am deeply familiar with the kind of intense religious bombardment the protagonist experienced -- it's pretty much par for the course for any place or subculture where religious fundies have a grip.

I thought the movie did an EXCELLENT job of portraying this aspect of the film. I thought maybe mother was a WEE bit over the top hateful and intrusive, not that I don't believe mothers like her exist, but that I think the filmmaker missed a big chance of portraying the way kindness can also be used as a tool for psychological manipulation.

The part the filmmaker UTTERLY screwed up was helping us understand the reason for the protagonist's rebellion. Was it adolescent angst, a healthy sexuality growing and rebelling against the repression, or just a healthy human response to the general repressiveness of evangelical beliefs? We have no idea, because the idiot filmmaker just gave us lots of shots of the lead actress looking sullen instead of any meaningful dialog that would have helped us UNDERSTAND the reason for all the sullenness. Of course, there was a lot of dialog with other young people on her blog that MIGHT have been illuminating, but it wasn't. It was just the usual shallow talk of normal teens about sex.

I was hoping for more depth, more insight, than a teen might have about the issues raised in the movie. I didn't get that. A shame, because without it, the movie is a real nothingburger.